Martha Tirion 1919.
I love this photo. Martha at 21 years old about to start her life adventure. Of course, it was a life tragically cut short, but here we can at least see some of the verve and sass of a woman ready to step into the world. That she chose a ship as her background is interesting. She (and her siblings) were competent sailors courtesy of her RN father and a life of living next to the sea but I think there is more. She would later write of "sea roads", and how the sea connects land and sky but also the physical and spiritual world in so many folk traditions around the world. Here she is upon her own sea road, heading to the West from Wales.
In her teens Martha had started to regularly write for her church paper on the local antiquities which caught the attention of local antiquarian and methodist pastor Edmund Stanley. He became in many ways Martha's coach and mentor, helping hone her writing and field work skills as well as connecting her with the wider archaeological community. She was an exceptional student. By the time this photo was taken, Martha had already published her first paper: "Antique Monuments of Northern Wales". In the paper she makes an intriguing statement: "[Why] have these monuments persisted for millennia, when their very fabric could find utility for the farmer or roadmaker? Whilst fortune plays her part in protecting these Great Stones, the agency of man is an aspect we must consider further." In her book Early Death Practices of Britain & Ireland, she would answer that question fully.
